Areas of practice

Licensing

Licensing is all around us. Every day we might drive, catch the bus or train or taxi, all these require permits and licences of one sort or another. When we go shopping, to the cinema, theatre or restaurant, licenses are in action behind the scenes. You are only likely to know about them if you have or require one for yourself or your business.

We can help you as you try to get and keep your licence. We can also help to tailor your licence to your needs either from the outset or by changing its conditions to suit your needs better.

It will help you to save time, energy and money to have our expert help guiding you to get, keep or change your licence. Our barristers will use their expert knowledge, detailed preparation and excellent advocacy skills to achieve this for you.

Failure to have a licence or a breach of its conditions can lead to a criminal prosecution or a claim for compensation may arise out of holding a licence. All our licensing barristers have full rights of audience and can attend at any licensing panel and all courts on appeal. They do either criminal or civil work in addition to licensing and can help with more than one area at a time without the need to spend more money on another specialist lawyer.

Our barristers have dealt with a wide variety of licensing cases from tuc-tucs to the Brighton Wheel, from skips to lap-dancing clubs. The most likely queries are listed below. If your query is not listed, please contact our clerks because we will probably be able to help you.

Hackney Carriage (Taxi)
and Private Hire

Make an Enquiry

Upon receiving this enquiry form a clerk will contact you within 2 working days to discuss your case in further detail. Please see our 4 steps outlining the process of instructing a Barrister with Barrister For Me.

Case studies

Licensing 1

Mahmood, a young entrepreneur, recently bought an off licence. He soon reduced his prices to compete with his nearby competitors. He promoted two for one offers and reduced his prices on alcohol as much as he could in the hope that customers would be enticed to buy other more profitable food items when they entered.

He changed his alcohol supplier and stocked foreign lagers and beers. He could not compete with the supermarkets on price so whenever and wherever they had sales he would buy a few bottles of wine. He tended not to keep all these receipts of these ad hoc purchases.

A number of local street drinkers stole from him, his CCTV was not working as he could afford to repair it immediately. Profits were so low that he even put a bottle of champagne he’d been given by a neighbour as a present on display. He did not drink himself on religious grounds.

The local authority, keen on keeping street drinkers to a minimum, visited his premises and later alleged that his beers did not meet labelling laws, that he was selling beers at below cost price, had some bottles of wine that bore the signs of being stolen. The police sought a review of his licence.

Mahmood did not know what this involved. He consulted the solicitor he used for property transaction and was quoted a price for negotiations, correspondence and instructing a barrister to conduct a review hearing before the local licensing panel.

Mahmood cannot afford to instruct a solicitor nor can he afford to lose his licence. He is fed up with the off licence and wants to sell the premises but without a licence he would lose a great deal of money.

His friend advises that he instruct a barrister direct and recommends a specialist licensing barrister who had acted for his friend. Mahmood meets the barrister at the barrister’s chamber in Brighton and is advised how to proceed, what to do and told what would happen.

Mahmood does all the things his solicitor would otherwise have done. He writes letters himself and the barrister checks them, and contacts his neighbours for references. He gathers evidence which shows the supermarkets prices were cheaper than the prices he could secure from his supplier.

At the panel hearing the barrister fully sets out Mahmood’s case and in particular why a small independent off licence owner should not lose his licence in the circumstances.

Mahmood is allowed to keep his licence and is able to sell his business at suitable price.

BARRISTERS IN THIS AREA

Save time and money by using the services of one of our Barristers without having to go via a Solicitor first – less stress, less expense. We have clerks waiting to advise you how to do this and who will recommend which Barrister is best placed to help you.